Romanian Safe Haven

Alex and I have spent the past 10 days coordinating help for refugees leaving Ukraine and entering Romania. Alex and Dasha are in a border town, about 4 hours away from us. They work from their hotel room and I work from our rental house make-shift office, with my snuggle bug rental cat. Our days begin and end with numerous texts and video chats in order to find the right connections and people, to meet these refugees every need....from transportation, reserving and paying for hotel rooms, feeding them breakfast, getting them to the asylum office to figure out their next steps, finding temporary housing for them within a network of churches, pastors, and Christian friends, putting them on the correct plane, train, bus or taxi, and most importantly translating everything for them into Russian/Ukrainian. These families, single moms, and orphans are petrified about leaving their homes and all that is familiar to them. Alex and Dasha do a great job greeting them at the hotel, ministering to them, praying with them, and helping them to feel a sense of courage to take the next steps into the unknown. Alex says, that they often say things like "I just wish we could stay with you forever, Alex and Dasha. We are afraid to leave you". The language barrier is huge for these people. Today, praise God, we found housing for a family of 16, nine of which are adopted or foster kids, a wonderful large space to call home, for as long as they need. All given freely to them by a church who wants to show hospitality to strangers, to the orphan, oppressed, and foreigner. We get to be a little piece of God's great big puzzle. It gives us great joy to see Him bring all the pieces together for His glory!